


Hear it in the Silence

by dirtylittlegreasemonkey



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: Gen, M/M, Suicide Attempt Referenced
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-06
Updated: 2017-04-06
Packaged: 2018-10-15 10:55:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10555142
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dirtylittlegreasemonkey/pseuds/dirtylittlegreasemonkey
Summary: Before Aaron is released from prison, Robert gets a phonecall in the dead of night from Andy. When they meet up, all of Robert's guilt comes pouring out and Andy deals him some home truths.





	

“Moore, eh?” the man at the counter says looking at the credit card. “Not a distant relation of Sir Bobby, by any chance? We get a lot of that lot dropping in with a hat and sunglasses on. Famouses.” He leans in, tries to study him.

“No relation,” he says, pulling down the peak of his cap and offering nothing but a tight smile, teeth covered.

Robert watches all this from a distance, standing with his hands in his pockets, thumb pressing into his car keys. In front of him is garish poster after garish poster advertising full English breakfasts and desserts that were at the height of popularity in the seventies. Offers for pensioners and a free drink when you buy a lunch deal. Behind him is the heavy thrum of grey motorway, smearing behind a rain flecked stretch of windows. There aren’t many motorists sat in here, a few lorry drivers sat alone and a miserable, yet tanned family of four. It’s a services that time forgot. A Little Chef, or what once was, now presumably run by the man at the till with a grease smeared apron and two days’ worth of stubble.

It takes Andy a while to turn around. He walks over to another counter first, picks up a few napkins and a spoon. Those little packets of sugar. He doesn’t collect enough stuff for two but then he’s probably expecting Robert to be a no-show. But when he does finally look up, there’s a slip of composure on his face, the falling apart of his lips and a strong pulse in his throat.

Robert nods and approaches, swallowing away months’ worth - years’ worth - of words and saying nothing aloud but: “Mate.” He should say brother, he should pull him forward and make him swear to come home, but they’ve never been very good at this and Andy’s smile of relief is more than he thought he’d get. Andy steps forward instead and begins a hug that Robert couldn’t. He didn’t dare to hope they’d ever see each other again. He feels and hears a thump of Andy’s palm against his shoulder blades and then they’re separated again, ushering each other to a table.

Sitting opposite to him under the artificial strip lights he can’t help but be reminded of sitting across from Aaron in the visitors’ room, that same empty expression in his eyes that are in Andy’s now. The same feeling of there being too much to say and not knowing where to begin, or even if he’ll have the guts to say it.

“Did you want a coffee?” Andy points over at the till, braced and swivelled to rise out of his seat.

“They don’t do a waiter service?”

“It’s not that kind of place,” Andy says, his eyeroll barely concealed. “It’s good to see some things never change.”

Robert runs his thumb across the sharp edge of his key again, fists back in his pockets. It is as it always was, edging the line between good humour and insults. This is their way, this is their: I’ve missed you. “Yeah well…” Robert says. “Nice to see you too.”

The phonecall had come one night, late one night. So late in fact it terrified him, curdled his blood. His phone had illuminated the bedroom blue and his brain headed straight for the worst case scenarios. All Aaron related. He was all Robert could think about. He was the reason for him not sleeping. The reason he wanted to sleep the days away too. The number on the display was withheld and he’d convinced himself it was the prison. Aaron was days away from coming home, but what if he couldn’t get through those final days? What if he’d done something stupid, or what if there’d been a fight? What if…what if….

Robert almost dropped the phone trying to answer it and then when he did there was a silence on the other end for five seconds that made his queasiness turn into a retch. He put his fist between his teeth.

“Answer please. Just tell me.” He could hear his own breath echoing back down the line.

And then a click, a drawing of breath. A delay on the phone. “Robert?”

Andy.

Relief and shock were the only emotions that were strong enough to break through his tower of numbness, guilt had ghosted him, the absence of Aaron left him coping with his own thoughts, his own nothingness. But at the sound of Andy’s voice, he found himself staggering backwards, voice choked as he responded to his brother.

He was back in the country, somehow aware of Lachlan’s imprisonment but knowing he still needed to keep a low profile until he figured out a better strategy of rejoining life as they knew it. Robert broke the news about Sarah, soft and reassuring as he could, sitting in the dark of the bedroom and feeling a physicality of the miles and miles that separated him from Andy and listening to him as he cried. After months of feeling helpless to rescue Aaron, there was a feeling of purpose in this call with Andy, a responsibility. Now that contact had been made, he was going to get Andy back where he belonged. Robert was a failure. He hadn’t saved himself and he hadn’t been able to save Aaron. Andy was his only chance to make things right. They arranged to meet. An anonymous service station café, hundreds of miles away from Emmerdale. Andy had hitched a lift from Dover and then bought the first motor he could get his hands on. He pointed it out in the car park – a bad paint job and covered in local radio station stickers.

“You look rough,” Robert says after he’s returned to the table after buying himself a drink and ordering Andy a breakfast. He looked thinner in the face, sallow cheeked. Robert couldn’t face anything to eat himself. When he ate lately it just felt like a mechanical process. A series of motions which he knew he needed to carry out but all it was, was filling a void.

“I’ve been kipping in the car for the last few days. I don’t want to waste all my cash on hotels if I can help it.”

“Look, don’t worry about legal fees. I’ll sort it. I’m not exactly rolling in it at the minute, but we’ll think of something.”

Andy nodded, lowering his head a little like he didn’t believe it. But the evasion of eye contact made sense when he next spoke. All he wanted to talk about was Sarah. He removed his hat, revealing messy unwashed hair.

“I can’t sleep. Ever since you told me about Sarah…” Andy says, his voice jerking at the mention of her name.

“I know,” Robert says, unable to think of anything but his own sleepless nights. The helplessness, the not knowing. That unbearable loss of control when the person you’d do anything for can’t be helped.  

“I had to keep fighting myself to stop ringing Debbie. I’ve been so close to calling…”

“It’s a really bad idea,” Robert says. “I know it’s hard…”

“You’ve got no idea.”

Robert’s fist tightens and he glances away, chest pounding with things unsaid. A retaliation fights its way onto his lips, but before it does the café owner approaches with a tray of two coffees and a breakfast for Andy, which Andy begrudgingly thanks Robert for.

Andy eats like a starved man as Robert tells him about Prague, about Sarah’s progress. The things he’s learnt from Charity and Chas. Silly little stories about the hospital staff and how much Sarah’s growing up. He tells Andy about Faith and what a nightmare she is, about Victoria, about Diane. About Ashley.

And then he talks strategies, because it’s easier than talking about himself or about Aaron. He tells Andy about what they should consider going forward, what sentence he might be facing if he hands himself in. How much, roughly, the cost of hiring someone decent would be. He tries to talk about the Whites as little as he can help it.   

When Andy’s plate is almost cleared, his mood shifts. Maybe it’s not just the food and the company, but the news from home, the news that his daughter is doing well and still talks about him all the time. There’s nothing worse than the unknown. Nothing worse when your brain is left to fill in the gaps and conjure doubts and dread into possible realities. He’s been there. Imagining Aaron high and vicious, telling the inmates about him. Asking for a bigger hit because why would it matter, why would getting out matter when he’s got nothing to live for, nothing on the outside. A useless husband that means nothing to him.

“So, go on then. What happened to all your millions?” Andy says, the sarcasm edgeless thanks to the brief smile he exchanges with Robert. He’d told Andy about the fundraising for Sarah’s treatment and Faith’s subsequent and suspicious arrest. He left out the wedding part, for a list of reasons he’s unwilling to think about for too long.

“Don’t ask,” Robert says, pressing his hand over his face, fingers against the bridge of his nose and then in the corners of his eyes. He thinks about Aaron’s solicitor fees. The Mill. The renovations, the wreck. The wreck in every sense.

He drags his fingers down his face and then rests his hands on the table.

“Is that…?” Andy’s brows are thick and low, worming out from under the shadow of his messy hair. His eyes are on Robert’s hand, his finger, the ring. He hadn’t thought about what Andy might notice.

Robert touches it and smiles. Can’t help himself.

“You got… _married_?”

He thinks of Aaron’s mouth pressed against his in the garage; the smell of tyres and oil and the aftershave he’d bought for Aaron; the wedding band pushed up his finger; his hands on Aaron’s waist; the rubber taste of the ale from the welly; he thinks of that giddiness which was more happiness than the alcohol everyone expected it was; he thinks of saying _my husband_ and it sounding right, easier than he could’ve ever hoped for.

“Yeah.”

“To Aaron?”

Robert gives him a look. “No. Chrissie and I decided to give it another go. What do you think?”

“Alright!” Andy says, raising his palms and then folding his arms across his chest. Even under the shapeless layers of clothes it’s like he’s using his chest as some sort of alpha-male shield. “I didn’t realise how seriously you were taking the whole gay thing.”

“Pretty seriously,” he says dryly. “It’s not a ‘thing’. I love him.”

“I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Well, how _did_ you mean it?” Robert asks. His gaze bores into the dark liquid in his mug.

“I dunno,” Andy says, cleaning up his plate with a crust of toast. “I don’t really get it, I suppose. One minute you’re sleeping with anything in a skirt –“

“You know what they say about glass houses, Andy?”

“-and then you’re…having a…gay wedding.”

“It wasn’t like that. It isn’t like that…that’s not how it is. It wasn’t a _gay_ anything. It’s just…Aaron’s different, alright? He’s special.” He sits back in his seat, defeated. Andy’s reaction is little more than an eyebrow raise.

Robert wraps his hands around the warmth of the mug and thinks of all the morning brews Aaron’s made for him and those he’s made for Aaron. The mornings. That feeling of contentment, completion. They had it. They had it all.

“So how is he, then? Your…”

“Husband?”

“Husband. Sorry, yeah. It’s not just you being…into…y’know…now, but Aaron, married? I didn’t think he was the sort.” It’s as if Andy is talking to himself, lost in a spiral of thoughts. Because of course, Andy watched Aaron grow up, watched the tough guy act – the smoking and the baseball caps. The violence, the loathing, the locking himself in a garage. The guy that hated who he was so much he wanted to die. The denial. The coming out. Jackson. And everything that followed. And no, he wasn’t the sort. He didn’t kiss in public. He didn’t believe in marriage. He hated romance and attention. He didn’t dance. And yet, with Robert his heart had opened. “He must really love you.”

Robert’s head falls and he has to dig his nails into the fleshy parts of his hand to block out the thoughts that override him. “Yeah. He does. More than I deserve.”

“Yeah well, someone needs to keep you in line.” He smiles, totally oblivious. “Married to a Dingle then, eh? Congratulations I ‘spose. Or should that be ‘Good luck’. How is he, anyway?”

The atmosphere tilts and it’s as if Robert has walked straight into a wall. When people used to talk about Aaron to him, when they were engaged before each thought of Aaron paralysed him with guilt and fear, he was always hit with this feeling of warmth. The smile that Aaron wore only for him. The sight of him in bed, soft and cosied. The grumpiness that was never sour or unlikeable, but endearing – made Robert want to draw it out of him. One mention of his name and he’d feel pride, a flood of admiration and respect for him, this loving, selfless, brave man. A man who’d chosen him, forgiven him, when he’d brought him so much pain and when he had a world of others who would surely love him better, even if they couldn’t love him stronger. When people mentioned Aaron to him, there was always an element of surprise to it, like they were sure there was an element of time, or fragility and instability to it. They had no idea that when they mentioned Aaron to him, he thought of Aaron – of everything he was, of everything he represented – and he thought of holding onto him for dear life. Forever.

“In prison,” Robert says, words so quiet they rise from his wince and he isn’t sure if Andy’s even heard.

“Prison?”

“He got twelve months,” Robert says, reliving it all – every day of it – without even looking up at Andy. He can’t. He focuses on the table, the menu. The coffee ring stains and the badly photographed meals on the laminated flyers in front of them. “GBH…but it wasn’t like that. He was defending a mate but things got out of hand and…”

Robert only realises, when Andy’s hand touches his arm and he jolts in surprise, that his breathing has become erratic, emotion bleeding into his voice. He didn’t need to look at Andy at all, Andy knew.

“Mate…”

“You know what he’s like, Andy. He’s a good bloke. He didn’t deserve that.”

“Course not,” Andy says. “Look, he’s got a temper. But he’s decent.” He gives Robert’s arm a little shake and a squeeze before releasing him. He’s glad of Andy’s distance again, he doesn’t deserve his sympathies. “He’s tough, isn’t he? He’ll be alright.”

Robert smiles for a second. The same lies he told himself. That Aaron would be alright. That they could survive this.

“He won’t be,” Robert says, shaking his head, doing everything he can to move out and away from Andy’s support, his concern. “Not when he finds out what I’ve done.”

“Why? What have you done?”

When he finally meets Andy’s eyes and tells him, it’s like having his chest opened up. Hacked away at with a pocket knife. It’s like telling Chas all over again, it’s like waking up and realising what he’d done. It’s like telling himself. It’s like telling his dad. It’s shame and grief and guilt setting alight anything good left inside of him. He wants Andy to hit him. He wants Andy to vocalise everything he’s been thinking about himself. He wants Andy to confirm what he already knows.

But Andy says nothing at first, just sits. Stares. Waits as the words gush out of Robert like blood.

He can’t stop himself. He doesn’t just talk about the mistake. He talks about falling in love with Aaron. About making a family with him, about finally feeling secure and settled like he never had before. He hears himself, a broken uncontrollable part of himself, tell Andy that for the first time in his life there were no walls up, no pretences. He was himself wholly with Aaron.

There’s a long drought of conversation afterwards when Robert’s finished. He’s barely mentioned her, except to say who she was and why it was her – because she was there and easy and meaningless and reminded him of how much simpler life could be to lie, to get by without love, without being true to himself. And how much she reminded him of a life he made himself believe he wanted, something so vacuous and ugly but a life that had been his goal for so long it was easy to pretend again.

But it was Aaron at every breath. Aaron he wanted, Aaron who was his life and Aaron who was his future.

And still nothing but silence from Andy. Robert wanted him to be angry, to be furious and spit Katie’s death at him and make him feel every blade of punishment.

“Say something then.”

“What’s there to say? You want me to act surprised?” Andy says. “I reckon it’s about time. You’ve spent your whole life hurting other people, ruining lives. And now it’s yours, yours you’ve destroyed. You had a chance to be happy, Rob. To be yourself. But maybe after everything you’ve done, you didn’t deserve it. Or maybe this is you. The real you. Maybe this is all you were ever meant to be.”

Robert’s throat is thick, head pulled towards his chest. He nods, unable to disagree with him. There’s no fight left.

“You’ve had chance after chance and nothing ever sticks, does it? Everything you do you just end up winning. Maybe it’s about time you lost something.”

“What am I supposed to do? I can’t lose him. I can’t bear it.”

Andy shakes his head, a disbelieving sneer. “Isn’t it a bit late for that? Do you know what I’d give for a second chance?”

“Don’t,” Robert says, Andy’s inference obvious. “I know, alright?”

“You talk about how much you love him. About how he made you feel complete. And you still cheated? Do you know what it’s like to sit here and listen to you talk about how he’s your world and your everything knowing that you threw it all away? Everything and everyone I ever loved was taken from me. You? You did this all by yourself.”

“Don’t you think I know that? I can’t live with myself, Andy.”

There must be something in his words or the way his voice cracks, perhaps the expression on his face. But something in Andy’s anger pauses, softens. Robert knows he’s a selfish man, knows that Andy thinks he is too, but maybe even he can see this isn’t the same as before, even when he’d lost Katie or Chrissie or even when he’d been shot. He’s never seen this side of Robert. Not just guilt or feeling sorry for himself, but the full force of remorse, regret.

“You’re going to have to,” he says.

“If he leaves me…”

“Then he’ll be better off.”

“I know,” Robert says, one sad, solitary nod. “Everyone’s better off without me.”

“I’m not here for your pity party, Rob.”

“It’s not what I’m asking for. I mean it, you were right. Just look at the everyone’s lives I’ve wrecked. I don’t have to tell you, do I? Everyone was right all along. He was always too good for me.”

“You’re not going to fix anything by feeling sorry for yourself.”

“What’s to fix? You said it yourself. I’ve lost him.”

“And that’s it, is it?”

“Well I don’t want it to be, do I? But what can I do?”

“You might’ve tried not sleeping with her.” He shoots Robert a look. “Sorry, not helpful.”

“If I could take it back…you’ve no idea…”

Andy fell quiet, hunched over his drink and studying his own hands. Robert didn’t need to look at him for long to know where his thoughts had headed.

“I hate myself,” Robert says so quietly that it barely unfolds before the words screw themselves back up inside.

“You’ve always hated yourself.”

“Not with him. Never with him.”

The café has emptied out even further now. The post-holiday family have left, dragging suitcases and tired flip-flopped feet with them, one of the lorry drivers has left, gone for a snooze in his Eddie Stobart and the other has slumped over a newspaper, hanging onto the dregs of a tea.

“People can forgive, you know,” Andy says. “He might not be able to look at you in the same way, but if he loves you like I think he does then…”

“What if he can’t forgive me?”

“People have forgiven you worse,” Andy says and for the first time since sitting down, both of them meet each other’s gaze and begin to really hear each other.

 


End file.
